Happy Birthday Darling 🩷

Birthdays, am I right? They arouse different feelings from various people. I've heard some say that they don't get the need to celebrate, while others make a huge fuss out of it! (Oops! I'm the fussy one). I have to admit though, this is a new feeling. It's like I am tussling with my heart and my mind, and all for what? Just because I am getting older? Hell no! I thought this only happens when you turn 30!

I have never found myself in this state, but I admit I find myself unraveling, piece by piece. Looking back at what was, what is, and what could have been! I have always believed in no regrets, just lessons—memories that are to be cherished and mistakes that are never to be repeated. However, of late, my heart has been heavy with many emotions. It's been a whirlwind and I keep finding myself blaming the hormones that maneuver us like waves, crashing against the most delicate parts of who we are. But that can't be it! It's too nagging of a sensation to be dismissed as just biological! As I sit here in the wee hours of the night (Psych! It's exactly 6:13 am. I just always wanted to say that or rather, to claim that I was burning the midnight oil, lol). Anyway, where was I? Yeah, as I am here typing this, my brain takes me to the past. To the actions that I have tried to hide and pretend that they don't give a clear picture of my true self. The lies that I have used to cover up parts of my life that I am not proud of because of the things I did for love, hate, passion, acceptance, and survival. The blanket I have forced on the years that have forged me into a weapon of intentional sustenance! A formidable person at that, but I still refuse to acknowledge who she was back then. I refuse to give her the flowers she deserves for who she fought to become. For the things she went through, that put her in positions to make choices she would have naturally shown contempt towards. I have had my fair share of life classes. Classes I flunked so badly that I thought I would never pick myself up, never fully complete the crash course that had suddenly become a part of my not-so-complex life and never be able to run away from being termed as a failure by every Jill, Jane, and Jullie who would have heard that story. Thank God I made it out of that rut!

Now, what to do with all this intel? How am I supposed to determine how to embrace a person who is so alien to me? A person I once despised so much but could never get away from cause well, they were all I could see looking back at me in the mirror. I am talking of embrace because everything else I have tried has failed, and age has knocked on my door and is demanding that justice be served. Dues to be paid or whatever that one Englishman said. How? Maybe if I use a metaphor I might find a solution that can match my reality. Let's see.

So I can't be a person because that would bring me close to realism which I find distasteful and complex. So what am I? An animal, a place, an item... An item it is. "What item, child?" Mhhhh... I know! I could be a drug. My creators could have made me with good intentions in mind. They could have wanted me to be great, to make a difference in the world, or to just fulfill my purpose. So, let me make a formal introduction.

Hi, my name is Nitroglycerin. My friends sometimes call me NG. I was created by a man who went by the name Ascanio Sobrero back in 1846 and was adopted as a commercially useful explosive by Alfred Nobel in 1864. I killed so many people and destroyed a couple of buildings trying to be used as an explosive because I was extremely unstable and difficult to handle. In my defense, this was my first time being used in this manner and I had no idea of my lethal potential! I even destroyed a Wells Fargo company office! I was that famous. I might sound unapologetic, but trust me, I am very sorry for all the havoc that I caused, and if I could turn back time, I would fix everything! Anywho, I stopped being the villain in this story and somehow I redeemed myself. As a matter of fact, big time! Before this though, I had to be put down! The UK government's hand was forced and they passed an act in 1869 called the Nitro-Glycerin Act of 1869. See, I was an absolute bad girl (or baddie. Whichever makes your heart glow). This act literally forbade me from traveling the world, or whatever, "an act to prohibit for a limited period the importation, and to restrict and regulate the carriage of Nitro-glycerine," means to you.

"Freedom is coming tomorrow!" - Sarafina.

Redemption. Sweet sweet heaven-sent redemption. This journey started with Alfred Nobel and his company developing dynamite by mixing me with diatomaceous earth (whatever this is). This proved to be a bit more stable and was adopted as a safer explosive for purposes such as mining. Now here's the cool part. In 1878, the physician William Murrell experimented by using me to alleviate angina pectoris (chest pain or discomfort due to coronary heart disease) and to reduce blood pressure. He began treating his patients with me in small diluted doses, and this treatment was soon adopted into widespread use after he published his results in the journal The Lancet in 1879. Now hear this, in 1896, before his death, Alfred Nobel, one of my founding fathers, was prescribed me for his heart condition! Would you look at that? I don't know about you, but I found that fascinating! He also found it very interesting as it is seen through his letter to a friend saying, "Isn't it the irony of fate that I have been prescribed nitroglycerin, to be taken internally! They call it Trinitrin, so as not to scare the chemist and the public." Today, 145 years later, cardiac patients carry dilute me in capsules or sprays to take sublingually in the event of chest pain or other coronary symptoms.

Sorry not sorry for the not-so-short history lesson, but guess what? I have finally found a solution to my dilemma. In case you haven't noticed, we are back to this confusing dimension called reality. You can pinch yourself to confirm. So in the same way nitroglycerin transitioned from a fatally unstable explosive to a paramount drug, I too faced the same change. Just like it, I too was not aware of my misgivings because I had never lived that life and been in that particular age, environment, or situation before. Aside from that, nitroglycerin also redefined itself and became a better explosive by being combined with other components and by being used in dilute portions to help patients in the medical sector. I did not get to be combined with stuff or diluted, but you get the point. I, in my own not-so-chemical reaction-related and whatnot ways, also became better. So, in the same way that the disasters were, and still are an important part of NG's cycle, my imperfect past is also important. And in the same way, I refuse to be ashamed of who I was and what I did. I now own all of it.

Therefore, here is me taking a page out of nitroglycerin's playbook, so I can become the best butterfly to have ever metamorphosed from a caterpillar!